In response to a recent op-ed by FOX Sports‘ columnist Jason Whitlock and a subsequent statement that “I [Whitlock] did not go as far as I’d like to go because my thoughts on the NRA and America‘s gun culture – I believe the NRA is the new KKK,” SAF has started a petition demanding an immediate and public apology to America’s gun owners.

During the halftime segment of the NFL’s December 2 Sunday Night Football broadcast on NBC, NBC Sports’ announcer Bob Costas quoted Whitlock’s column and blamed the murder of Kasandra Perkins and suicide death of Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher on America’s “gun culture” of law-abiding gun owners and civil rights activists.

SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb said that Whitlock’s recent column is “ludicrous” and Costas’ on-air commentary “shameful.”

“The point Whitlock misses completely is that Jovan Belcher – a massive NFL linebacker – had every intention of murdering the mother of his 3-month-old child, one way or another. Had Perkins had a firearm herself, perhaps their daughter would not be an orphan today. Regardless, America’s millions of law-abiding and peaceful gun owners don’t deserve to be blamed for this tragic circumstance and it’s appalling that we would be singled out as Whitlock and Costas have done.”

“These outrageous comments by Costas and Whitlock show how detached from the American mainstream the anti-civil rights element really is,” said Brandon Combs, SAF Director of Programs and Outreach. “Millions of people across the U.S. choose to defend their lives and those of their family with common semi-automatic handguns, the same kind Mr. Costas doesn’t see any need for. Thankfully, the Constitution takes his firearms policy preferences off the table.”

“Guns save lives, thousands of them, every day. Indicting Constitutionally-protected instruments of self defense – and a majority of Americans who participate in our long history and culture of private gun ownership – for the deaths of Perkins and Belcher is simply wrong-headed and irresponsible.”